Adding fuel to the fiery assertion that men don't pay attention to the details is a recent post on Reddit. The original poster (OP) is accusing her husband of a decade of failing to know fairly crucial info: her parents' names.
The anonymous woman admitted that her husband has always been "self-centered."
But even the self-centered should have their limits.
It's not malicious, she explained on r/JustNoSO, because "he genuinely doesn't seem to know how to care about other people or work at getting to know people."
It didn't bother her so much when they first started dating.
A healthy dose of both couple's therapy and her own therapist, however, has taught her that some of his behavior is not OK.
"I grew up in a very abusive house, and someone who had a career, a house of their own, and would 'have me' was enough back then," she wrote, referring to the start of their relationship. But things that seemed normal or "whatever" to her when they first met have become "a big deal now."
Because of these revelations, her relationship with her husband is "steadily disintegrating."
Her husband feels like it's a "burden" to fix what's broken, whereas she's been trying to save their relationship.
Things are complicated by the Redditor's relationship with her parents.
She's been estranged from them since she went to college 20 years ago. After her father died, she tried to open up communication with her mother again — but their relationship is still not in good shape.
Things really boiled over when the wife tried to put her foot down and make her husband pay attention to her.
The two got into an argument because "I don't feel emotionally close to him" and "sex is off the table until we rectify that."
"I don't want detached, impersonal, objectifying sex anymore," she wrote.
Her husband shot back that he knew "everything about you." Except, not really.
"You do?" she asked him. "'What are my parent's names? What was the name of the company where I started my dream job?' He didn't know either."
After making excuses, the next morning he took a stab at her parents' names.
But both guesses were "not even close."
"He started taking accountability and said he was sorry (getting him to ever say sorry has been a project all by itself), but then he backtracked and was like, 'You don't even talk to them, they're like ghosts to me,'" she wrote.
She's not buying that excuse.
"You should still know your wife's parents' names," she wrote.
Redditors encouraged the OP to think about how much work her husband is willing to put in to change.
"You are asking him to change into almost a different person. Do you think that is possible? Does he want to change?" one commenter asked.
The wife responded that her husband has been slowly getting onboard with therapy "and started 'doing the work' because I’ve given ultimatums."
"A relationship that requires multi-ultimatums isn’t much of a relationship to start with," a second commenter remarked.
A third person might have said it best: "He can say pretty words but it’s his actions that matter. Personally, I don’t think he will [change]. This change doesn’t benefit him, so he has no real reason to change. You deserve better, and if he’s not willing to try, you should leave to find your own happiness."
That said, a few people confessed that they also don't know their in-laws' names.
"You just made me realize I can't easily recall my partner's father's name …" one commenter wrote.
"My boyfriend only told me his dad's name once, so sometimes it takes me a minute to remember too," some else wrote in. "But we'll get there, just have to remember what part of our brains we left the information in."
"Not to defend your husband but, why should he know their names?" a third person wondered. "You probably refer to them as mom and dad and [they] are not in your life in anyway. It is an irrelevant piece of information."
The OP later wrote that she wasn't ready to walk away from her marriage just yet.
She's just "having a really hard time loving him."
"I want a better partner, and I want HIM to be that better partner. We have a kid, and I have to give him every opportunity to make this right," she wrote. "If he doesn’t, that’s his choice. I’m not ready to walk quite yet."
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
